1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a method of notifying a user of information about a commodity in a system selling the commodity by using a communications network. In addition, the present invention is useful in a field, for example, electronic business transactions or e-commerce.
2. Description of the Related Art
In recent years, services selling or offering a commodity by using a shopping site built on a communications network has been increasing rapidly. With such a type of service, if a user (a consumer or a customer) accesses a shopping site by using a terminal device such as a personal computer, etc., a catalog, etc. of commodities offered by the shopping site is displayed on the terminal device of the user in normal cases. Here, the user can reference the displayed catalog and order his or her desired commodity. In the meantime, a commodity seller that operates the shopping site ships the corresponding commodity to a specified destination by order of the user.
Incidentally, there are often cases where a commodity seller cannot offer a commodity handled by its own shopping site. Examples include a case where the commodity is out of stock. At an existing shopping site, such a commodity (sometimes referred to as an “out-of-stock commodity” hereinafter) is deleted from the catalog of the shopping site, or disabled to be placed in a shopping cart.
At this time, if the user attempts to purchase the out-of-stock commodity at the shopping site, he or she must repeatedly visit the shopping site so as to verify if the commodity has arrived, which is troublesome for the user. In consequence, the commodity seller can possibly lose a business opportunity, because the seller is not able to sell an out-of-stock commodity to a user who accesses the site and is in need of the commodity.
As one of solutions to this problem, for example, rendered is a service that notifies, via e-mail, a user who accesses a commodity while it is out of stock that the commodity has become available when it arrives. With this service, however, a user cannot purchase the commodity in some cases despite the receipt of the notification that the commodity has arrived, if a large number of users who received the notification simultaneously visit the shopping site. Assume that 100 users access an out-of-stock commodity. Also assume that a commodity seller obtains only 10 identical commodities. In this case, with the existing service, notification that the out-of-stock commodity has arrived is simultaneously transmitted to the 100 users via e-mail. Accordingly, some of the users can purchase the commodity based on the notification, but the rest of the users cannot purchase the commodity despite the receipt of the notification that the commodity has arrived.